Shatter Me
by Ookami21Kage
Summary: Bucky's programming starts to fail and he remembers someone important. Now forced to live his life without her, he fights the losing battle with the Winter Soldier on his own. Until Steve comes face to face with a blast from the past that will change the course of their lives forever. Warnings: language, might be a little OOC for CA. OC centric in parts, focus on WS though
1. PART 1: Dim Flickering Candle Light

PLEASE READ BEFORE COMMENCING STORY:

There are a lot of inaccuracies in this story, I am aware. It's just a story, calm down.

I know the story about the girl without a cerebellum is based on a true story, but it doesn't actually have anything to do with that… I didn't even know it had really happened until someone pointed it out to me. I did a semester of Neuroscience so I have a bit of a background, but only the basics.

I know the story is OC centric at times and a lot of people don't like that, feel free to stop reading at any point, I'm not holding a gun to your head. The point of the story, however, is the subtle truths that the OC tells. She serves more as the conscience of the characters than an entity on her own as she is unattainable at best, in reality.

I hope someone, at least, sees the merit in the concept and enjoys the idea as much as I did. It's quite a leap of faith, but hey… It's about time I took a risk like this and put myself out there again.

Now without further stalling:

**PART 1: Dim Flickering Candle Light in the Darkest Night**

Adelaide Kane stared silently at the brain scans before her, the backlight of the x-ray viewing screens hummed softly. No matter how many times she did this, the human brain never ceased to amaze her. When she was contacted by this particular hospital to consult on this particular case she was not expecting to walk into a situation she has never dealt with before. She thought she'd seen it all.

Yet, the scans do not lie; a young woman born without a cerebellum. Living, breathing, functioning as a normal human being, baring a few mild neural impairments, but missing an entire part of crucial grey matter. In the last few decades she had often come to question exactly why she continued on this path she had chosen for herself. Why medicine? Why couldn't she be a simple woman who got excited about the perfect pair of shoes, or a woman who dreamt only of her wedding day and the 2.5 kids she would have? The bliss an ordinary life can bring to some people astounded her. Why was she constantly plagued by this… _ambition_… this curse. She sighed. Cases such as this brought back a flicker of recognition for why she started on this path all those years ago. The brash attempt to quell the aching need to _know_ more, to _understand_ more. And why medicine? Well, the human species of course. Since the day she watched her mother die from a disease that could not claim her little sister, Adelaide had been fascinated by the astonishing capacity of the human body to heal itself… and sometimes, its failure to do so.

After graduating from Johns Hopkins University as one of the first females in her field at 21, she had spent years on her search to understand the intricacies of life, and this search led her from the rigid and scientific world of medicine into the tangible and uncertain waters of psychology, which she chose to actively avoid of late. Because, as it turned out, it was the human spirit that truly held its sway over the course of a person's life. Sure, dread diseases played their part, but the underlying fact, the fact that interested Adelaide the most, was the fact that those who do not want to fight do not make it. Why is it that one's _will_ to live is so dreadfully important when all else fades away?

"Dr. Kane?" The nurse's voice brought her back to the present as she turned around to face the younger woman. "Dr. Kellman is ready for you." The nurse added. Adelaide nodded as the nurse departed.

Dr. David Kellman was a gentleman with greying hair and round glasses. He waited for Adelaide in a consultation room, a nervous look in his eyes which he seemed to hide fairly well. Years and years of practice, Adelaide imagined. He was frantically paging through a well-cared for copy of _Cognitive NeuroScience_ by a doctor 'Louis A. Hale', the book was considered one of the most accurate tomes of human neural functioning ever compiled. Adelaide sighed under her breath, the name now seemed alien to her, one that had fallen out of use long ago.

"Ah! Adelaide, good to see you. Sister Austin tells me that you have perused the scans thoroughly and that you have had a chance to speak to the patient, yes?" He stammers hastily over the words as he looks at her with a flicker of hope in his eyes.

"I have." Is all she gives back.

"What are we to do?" He asks, uncertain of her calm demeanour in a situation that obviously unnerves him. It _would_ unnerve him, he has not seen as much as she has, but he will never know that.

Adelaide sighs, audibly this time. "The patient seems content, David. She came in complaining of a headache and that seems to be her biggest concern. The only obvious neural disturbance she seems to have is a slight slur and a moderate gate. The initial neurological exam is fascinating, but not concerning. I would suggest you monitor her and perhaps arrange for some collateral care by a neuropsychologist and a physiotherapist. Other than that, give her a migraine cocktail and send the poor woman home. I reckon you have sufficiently frightened her as it stands."

Adelaide has quite a number of years on Dr. Kellman, he was only now approaching his early 60's and had much still to learn of the consequences of immersing oneself too deeply into a specific case. In a small city such as this it was unlikely that he had seen such a significant case before. Dr. Kellman scoffed at her indignantly. He had been warned of Dr. Kane's frankness, but he did not expect her to seem quite so disinterested in an obviously unique find such as this. "But she is missing an entire segment of her brain! She should not even be alive!"

"Dr. Kellman, in all my years in the field I have learned but one thing worth remembering thus far, and that is; no matter what, life will out. In the end we need to understand where to draw the line in just how much we attempt to do for our patients. The fact that she is alive is a miracle, yes, but often survival is a much simpler thing than we realize. It is the only option she had, and it was a choice that she did not necessarily realize she was making." She paused and watched the anger and indignation flare within him. "If you wish to explore the case in more detail then feel free to do so. I will put you in contact with one of my colleagues in Washington. He is an expert in the field and has built up quite the reputation for himself. He would be more than willing to help you in any way. I, on the other hand, must return to my own work as I do not believe I could be much help to you any further. My interests, as you are aware, lie with behaviour and human nature, although I have spent some time exploring neurology it is not my field of practice any longer."

He seemed taken aback by this statement. She was one of the most acclaimed neurosurgeons of the 21st Century, and hearing of someone abandoning their field so idly must come as a shock to a man like David Kellman. She knew that the only reason he had contacted her instead of Dr. Allan was because he heard she was related to the great Louis Hale. If he only knew…

After a rushed apology and quick exchange of collateral information and the contact details of Dr. Allan from Washington, Adelaide returned to her hotel room. It was only as she switched the flat screen TV on that she took note of the date. It was her birthday. She snorted and rubbed her aching neck. _I'm getting too old for this_. She found herself thinking.

So many decades spent immersed in science and books has left her weary. She needed a change of scenery. Adelaide slowly shed her clothes and shoes and padded over to the en-suit bathroom. The hotel room was luxurious and spacious. Decorated in a white and silver modern twist. She liked where décor was going; away from the madness of the 90's into a cleaner, colder direction. The plush off-white carpet gave way to cold white tiles. She relished the cold, an odd trait for someone who grew up poor, in Brooklyn, covered in snow.

For a moment her eyes caught a glimpse of a haunting sight; her reflection in the ceiling-to-floor mirror. Adelaide turned for a moment to look at herself, for the first time in a long time. She was old now, born in 1925, 89 years ago today….

Her slender figure was well looked after over the years and the time she had served as a field medic in the war saw to it that she held a fitter appearance than most women did. Her breasts were ample and proportionate to her hour glass figure, even naked like this they sat high on her chest. Her neckline was slender and classic, well defined despite her average height. Her skin was milky white and flawless… As tight as it had ever been. Her eyes were pools of dark green and her hair a wavy mass of cascading black silk that hung down her toned back past her tight buttocks, not a single grey could be found on her head. Her hands were small and her fingers slender, perfect for intricate surgery. And finally, her face was soft and pale, her feminine features held some subtle sharp edges, giving her the air of an outspoken, confident young woman… She was 89 years old, but had not seen a moments' whither beyond her 27th year. No wonder David had been so indignant when she spoke of her 'years of service'. She shook her head. To him she was nothing more than a silly girl barely out of med school, but this was not new to her.

The water from the shower hid the tears as they ran idly down her cheeks. Adelaide cursed under her breath as she shook her head disapprovingly. "You would think I'd be over it by now…" She whispered into the steam around her. _All these years and he still makes me cry. _She turned off the water and walked naked and wet back into the room, the cold air on her wet skin giving her goose bumps and making her remember him so much clearer. She reached out and picked up the chain on the bed that held the last remaining tie to her past: an engagement ring and 2 dog tags. Inside the ring was engraved the words 'forever mine'. Why tonight, why now? He'd been dead for so long and she made her peace with that a long time ago, but for some reason, she was crying for him again tonight. His cold blue eyes and cocky smile fresh in her mind as her thumb ran over the letters of his name engraved in the cold steel of the dog tag.

_Sgt. James Buchanan Barnes_

-X-X-X-X-

Steve Rogers sat in the living room of his floor in Stark Tower, staring into nothing. His head was still reeling and his body still hurt. Memories flooded his mind in waves crashing unforgivingly onto the shore. Memories from his childhood, from his life before the serum. He remembered when they were children together, when they graduated highschool, when they moved out. He remembered everything so clearly; the days in the military, their time together in the Howling Commandos. He especially remembered the day his friend died… But Bucky… Bucky couldn't even remember his own name. Steve felt suddenly sick. Tears spilled from his eyes as the force of his reverie struck him to the core. He's been alive all this time, tormented and treated like a weapon, his mind taken from him. The weight of that thought bore down on the super soldier with unimaginable force. It was as if Bucky was dying again, right in front of him, over and over, until there was nothing left but what Steve had done… or what he had not done. He should have gone back for him. He should have gone to look for him.

Steve sobbed into his hands and let the pain consume him. If anything, he deserved nothing less.

-X-X-X-X-

It took Steve some time to find his composure again after that night back at the tower after his fight with Bucky in the helicarrier. But after about 2 weeks he found the courage to face the world again, albeit only to extract more information. He spoke to Natasha first, asking her if it was possible to get his hands on the original Winter Soldier file. She agreed to find it for him.

Additionally he asked Tony to do some digging and find out what he could from HYDRA and SHIELD's files on the internet. Now he was reviewing them with Tony in one of his many labs. Most of the information available related to the programming used to create the Winter Soldier. Steve didn't really want to know much about this, he couldn't bare it once he realized how brutal the process was.

One of the files that Tony opened contained a whole lot of information on Steve and Bucky before the war. Old photographs and video clips of them out with friends. Even though it wasn't necessarily essential information, Steve wanted to go through them, to make sure that no one had been watching them back then. The images flash before his eyes at a steady pace.

There was a set of photos depicting him and Bucky at a party at Bucky's parents' house. The faces were so familiar and yet they seemed so far away, as if he had only dreamt of those people, that they never really existed. Tony skipped to the next clip, which turned out to be video clip of the same day. It started with people laughing and glasses clinking, then focused in on people sitting around a table. Steve barely recognised himself in the clip, scrawny and small compared to the other people. Bucky was sitting next to him with a glass and a cigarette in one hand and his other arm around a girl sitting on his lap. Steve recognised her, and in seeing her he remembered what the party was about. It was an engagement party for Bucky. The engagement hadn't really come as much of a shock as the two of them had been inseparable since the day that Steve introduced them to each other 2 years prior. Someone called from outside the shot "Amaryne! Can I bring you a drink?" Amaryne turned around and nodded with a bright smile on her face. She swung one arm around Bucky's neck and kissed him without a care in the world. "Damn, Miss Hale, do you have any idea what you're getting yourself in to?" One of Bucky's brothers quipped at seeing the stupid smile on Bucky's face. The clip cuts off shortly after that, leaving Steve feeling heavier than before. Amaryne had spent the remainder of her life believing Bucky was dead. Steve wondered what she had done with her life eventually. She was always an ambitious young woman who had defied almost every social standard of the age. He couldn't help but think that she would have been extremely proud of what her defiance had meant for woman, judging by current social standards. It was girls like Amaryne and Peggy who shaped gender equality, without ever having such broad thoughts on what their defiance would mean 70 years later.

Despite everything, he found little useful information in the files that SHIELD and HYDRA had on him and Bucky. He needed to get his hands on the original Winter Soldier file.

That night Steve found himself strangled by yet another unbearable realization. If he did get Bucky back, and he started remembering, he would be faced with living the rest of his life without Amy. He knew what it was like for him learning about Peggy after he came back, and he had never even really had a relationship with her before. But Bucky knew Amy for a long time and they had been together for more than 7 years by the time Bucky died. For all his charm and way he had with women Bucky never really strayed from her. He took other girls out and danced and drank with them, but his heart always belonged to Amy, till the day he died. The Bucky that loved her would be devastated at her loss, the same way she had been at his. The last thing that Steve found himself wondering before he drifted off into a fitful sleep was whether Amy ever found peace after everything that happened. She was left all alone in the world back then, a world that frowned upon women with big dreams and big minds.

-X-X-X-X-

The Winter Soldier ran his right hand through his long hair as he looked at himself in the mirror. He barely recognised himself, never quite sure who was staring back at him. Since he dragged the Target out of the water that day he's been to hell and back. Now that his conditioned pathways were not being reinforced the barricades in his mind were collapsing.

He was constantly plagued by vivid, yet fragmented memories of a life he never even imagined he could've had. Friends, family, ambitions and goals of his own. He remembered other things as well, things that HYDRA and the Russians did to him. His right hand idly made its way down his neck and rested on the red star imprinted on his metal arm. The metal was cold and felt numb to him now; as if it was the first time he noticed it was there.

At times he didn't know whether to scream or cry at the things that ran through his head, but today he was oddly calm. He'd spent the whole of the previous day reliving memories of HYDRA torturing him, but now his mind seemed a little clearer. It was the first time he vaguely felt like himself in hell knows how long, not that he even knew what that meant; to feel like himself. He pulled a shirt over his head quickly and zipped up a black hoody to hide his face before he headed out the door of the motel room he'd been staying in.

He hated being in public, surrounded by people. Crowds made him nervous and he became agitated and tired so fast when he was around people. He was constantly checking for danger, someone was most likely following him and he was damn sure that he couldn't trust anyone. To top it all off; half the time he wasn't even sure if what he did was _him _ or something that he had been programmed to do. Life, in general, was exhausting and dejecting to the Winter Soldier at present moment, or the Asset, or what the fuck ever he was supposed to be.

As he hurried through the crowd, he could hear his heart beating in his ears as he started to get tunnel vision, he knew this feeling and he fucking hated it. Soon he'd be feeling like he was dying again, and that in and of itself brought back a lot of memories he could do without.

He suddenly bumped into someone, which slowed him down. Although the other person, whoever it was, kept walking, it threw the Winter Soldier off guard. He came to a standstill for a moment to reorientate himself, trying to focus through the haze of people and the sound of his own blood pumping in his head.

He took a deep breath through his nose to try and steady himself. A rich smell filled him then. A familiar smell. A soothing smell. He closed his eyes where he stood, very out of character as it left him slightly more vulnerable. He breathed the smell in again trying to place it. Coffee. It was the smell of freshly brewed coffee. As if in a dream the rushing in head ceased and his heart rate slowed. The smell was so comforting that it sent the panic within him packing as quickly as it had come. When he opened his eyes again he found himself face to face with an inquisitive looking little girl staring up at him.

"Are you okay?" She asked, mouth slightly agape and head cocked to the side.

"Yeah. I'm fine." He answered. His voice sounded rough and heavy from disuse, but oddly enough he found himself believing the lie he was telling her, for some reason.

"What happened to you?" She asked pointing at his metal hand which he now realized was hovering at his side instead of tucked into a pocket as usual.

Something inside him compelled an absurd answer that he found he could not stop. "Cigarettes" He said with an alien sensation in his stomach and an odd smirk tugging at his lips. He could not fathom what would drive him to give such a ridiculous answer, but he didn't think it was programming that compelled it, either. For the moment at least, he decided to go with it.

She stared up at him with a typically shocked expression on her delicate features. Then, to his surprise, chose to ignore the information she had just been given. "Who are you?" She asked, the shock vanishing in an instant and being replaced by curiosity again.

This question was a little harder for him to answer. He wasn't exactly sure himself, but something inside of him insisted that you just don't leave a child's question unanswered.

"I'm Bucky." The words came on their own accord and flowed freely from his lips before he had consciously realized what he had said. Once he became more readily aware of what he'd said he found that he was stupidly happy about it. The little girl seemed content with this as she smiled up at him. "Hi Bucky! I'm Amaryne!"

Before he could say anything in return the girl's mother came rushing back and grabbed her by the arm, leading her away. _Amaryne_… The name kept ringing in his ears long after the little girl had been dragged off by her mother. It was the first time in a long time that he had had any meaningful interaction with another human being. And it was the first time that the other human being hadn't cared what he'd done or what had happened to him. All she wanted was to know his name, and to know if he was okay. This small assurance gave him a warm and hopeful feeling among the cold desolation that had plagued his life for weeks now. Maybe there was hope after all…

-X-X-X-X-

That night he found himself back in a warzone. He wasn't sure which warzone it was or when exactly it had happened, but it must have been a long time ago. There was snow everywhere and he was cold down to his bones. There were others with him, huddled around a fire.

Then the image faded and he was strapped down to a cold table, pain throbbing in his head. He could hear his own voice mumbling something… numbers?... into the darkness. The darkness faded into sudden painfully bright fluorescent lights above him. Fear started to drum in his shattered mind once more. His breathing became faster and he started to shake.

He wasn't sure now if he was awake or if this was still a dream. The smell of burning electricity permeated the air and he could hear people talking in the distance. He can't make out exactly what they're saying, but he recognizes the voices, or at least, a part of him does. Then he hears it, those two words that always send him into a downwards spiral that never ends well. "Wipe him." A voice says and then there is only pain.

He thrashes awake suddenly, gun in his hands, pointing at the wall on the other end of the room. When he realized that there is no one around he puts the gun down next to him. He is drenched in sweat and shaking where he's sitting. He can't decide what's worse; the dreams or the flashes of memory when he's awake. What was the point of all this? What was the fucking point of trying to sift through all of this shit in his mind if there was no one who gave a fiddlers fuck about him. Sure he knew this Captain America character from the bridge, and the guy had said some stuff about being his friend and something about a line, but that didn't mean a whole lot to him right now. Why would this guy even still care since the Soldier was pretty sure this so called 'friendship' was from years ago. His mind drifted back to the overwhelming calming feeling that the coffee smell had given him. He tried to remember what that had felt like, grasping at it for dear life. Anything to get this _panic_ out of his mind.

He remembered the smell, sure enough, and although it gave him a little bit of comfort, it didn't help all that much now. Then he thought of the little girl in all her innocence. He was jealous of her now, so untouched by the world and it's all it god damn horrors. He tried to keep her in his mind, anything to try and ignore the panic that was building up inside him. He started shaking and he could feel his throat closing, denying him the precious air he needed to survive. What was her name? Ama something? Amanda? No, it was strange, almost, something to do with the weather. Oh yeah; Amaryne. Her name was Amaryne…

He frowned. Why did he know that it had something to do with the weather? It means rain, doesn't it? A memory tugged at a deep and buried part of his psyche as he focused in on the name, separating it from the girl somehow. He, with quite a bit of hesitation, focused in on the name a little more, tugging back at the distant memory. A face appeared in from of him then. A young woman, a little younger than he was at the time.

A vibrant, smirking, face that filled him with an all-consuming fire that burned the cold from his bones. Marble white skin and dark hair framed her face and she crinkled up her nose and reached for him. This startled him out of his reverie as he suddenly ducked away from the imaginary touch. For a moment he just sat there in silence, arms out behind him on the bed as he had ducked back from his previously forward slumped over position. He was almost calm in the silence of the night now but he had the strangest sensation at the back of his throat and there was water on his cheeks. He reached up hesitantly with his right hand and touched the moisture on his face. Not water; tears. He was crying.

It was an entirely foreign sensation to him. He couldn't decide whether it was better or worse than the panic. Once he realized that he was crying and not panicking anymore he found that he could not fight it. He ran his right hand through his hair again and let it rest on the back of his neck as he bowed his head forward and allowed himself to cry for the first time in what he imaged to be a hell of a long time. This new sense of despair and utter loneliness was yet another new thing that he had to come to terms with in his fucked up rollercoaster of a world. The Soldier vowed to stay the hell away from memories like that from now on. Anything was better than _this_.

He woke up the next morning lying on his stomach, clutching a pillow. He didn't know how long he'd spent crying, but it obviously hadn't been enough as he still had the extremely empty feeling inside of him. For once, Bucky found himself wishing he was the Winter Soldier again.

-X-X-X-X-

Every possible lead that Steve and Sam followed on Bucky came up dry. He was damn good at covering his tracks. "You know, at some point you're gonna have to let the man be." Sam knew it was a hard truth to tell and he was sure that it was even harder to hear, but it needed saying.

"I can't do that." Steve said where he stood with his hands in his pockets staring out at the bay. They were standing on the harbour, overlooking the ship yard. It was the last place that Bucky had been spotted by what remained of the SHIELD agents who remained loyal to Fury. By now it had become evident that Bucky knew he was being followed. He let himself be seen and then he slipped away and vanished into thin air. Steve was at his wits-end. All he wanted to do was help, to make sure that Buck was safe, to pay him back for all the years that he spent protecting Steve.

"I know man. I'm just saying." Sam stated looking down at his feet.

"I just don't know what he's running from." Steve admitted, sounding more than a little distant.

Bucky watched them from a safe distance. He was standing with his back against a wall, just listening, trying to ascertain why Captain America… Steve was so intent on finding him. A part of him, a big part, believed that the man who called himself a friend could be trusted, but he was hesitant none the less. Besides trust, he didn't know if he could face people yet, especially not people who knew more about him than he did.

Part of his training and programming had taught him the very best places to hide where in plain sight and he realized that he actually fit into a crowd pretty well when he meant to. He was wearing a baseball cap and a hoody again, the place was crawling with SHIELD agents a while ago, but now they had dispersed, believing that he was long gone. Leaving only Steve and the other man, Sam, here.

Bucky had realized that Sam seemed to be a friend, and he had a feeling that he could trust Sam too if need be, still he remained in the shadows, watching and listening. Every time Steve showed up to find Bucky without result seemed to hit the man harder and Bucky was beginning to feel guilty about drawing him out like this only to leave him disappointed, but he had to be sure.

He rubbed his burning and tired eyes. Truth be told; he hadn't slept in far too long. He realized that he could deal with dreams of being tortured and torturing other people, but he could not cope with the longing and the utter despair that came hand in hand with dreams of Amaryne, not the little girl, but the woman the name had led him to. He had since put two and two together and came to the conclusion that even if she was not a figment of his imagination; she was long dead by now. He'd recently begun to remember more details about her. And every so often Steve was in some of those flashes of broken memory as well, but not as he is now; as a scrawny little kid. This is what threw Bucky off the most. Was this just how his mind chose to remember the man? Did he really look like that? What the hell had happened to him? It all seemed a little too suspicious.

He sighed as he pushed himself away from the wall and slowly began to make his way back to the motel, back to another tormented sleepless night.

Bucky was not wrong in believing that this would be another sleepless night. It started like it always did, flashes that made his head spin and his body shake, then he takes a scalding hot shower in hopes that the steam would cloud his mind enough to blank out the images. This wouldn't change anything. Then he would lie down and try to sleep, only to be awoken, not in the initial fit of fear anymore; but silently with an empty throbbing feeling in his soul.

His dreams weren't feverish and rushed so much anymore, unless they were about his conditioning. When he dreamt about her they were quiet and subtle. The way she said his name; not Bucky, but James. The way she sat in his lap, facing him, with her arms around his neck, promising him that she'd always be there when he gets back, no matter how far he goes or what he does, she will always be there. He dreams how she laughed at him when he asked her to marry him and how she sat awake on the porch the whole night reading by candle light. These things he remembers, vividly and less fragmented.

Tonight it starts with a new memory. This time Steve was there, walking in front of him, telling him about this girl he has to meet who's just like him. He remembers thinking this was preposterous. It occurred to him that Steve had talked about her before, but he called her something different, Lou? Was it? Something like that.

She was younger then; still a school girl. Steve greeted her first, she called him Rogers as if it was a title. Then he introduced Bucky, she crinkled her nose and giggled, "What kind of a name is _Bucky_?" she snorted. Steve protested at her forwardness, but Bucky found it strangely inviting. "Lucky for you I have a few to choose from." He heard himself say. "The name is James Buchanan Barnes, _Lou_." He added, placing the same amusement behind her name as she had done to his. The grin faded from her delicate face and was replaced with an earnest, and shy smile. She was biting the sleeve of her jersey like a naughty schoolboy. "Amaryne Louise Hale." She said softly, extending the other hand to him.

Before he was allowed to see any more of that memory it warped about and changed into her standing in front of him reaching that hand up to rest on his cheek. She was older now, and wearing the ring he had given her. Amaryne had a sad smile on her face and a slight glint in her eyes. This time she wore a uniform, something medical.

Her dark mass of hair was tied up behind her head. "I'll bring him back in one piece, Lou, I promise." He heard Steve's voice behind him. "Shut up Rogers," She insisted absent mindedly as she smirked at Bucky. "Just don't let the star spangled moron get himself killed out there, will ya Bee?" She whispered at him. He snorted. "Lord knows I'm not hauling his lifeless ass all the way back to base if he does." He hears himself answer. She laughs, then and puts her arms around him. He smothers himself into her embrace and whispers into her neck; "Don't do anything stupid until I get back." She hugs him tighter. "How could I, since you're taking all the stupid with you." That's all they say, it's all they need to say. They've done this before. As he turns and catches a glimpse of Steve in his classic Captain America outfit he cannot help but feel as though this was the last time he will ever see her…

At that his eyes snap open and he is faced with nothing but cold and heartbreak once again. This time he does not cry, he has no more tears left to spill. He just lies there in silence, clinging to the memory of what HYDRA had truly taken from him. As the sun rose in the distance, hours later, Bucky made a choice; the only way he was going to get answers about her was from the closest thing he had left to her: from Steve Rogers. Memories he could avoid, but he had no control over his dreams, so he had no choice but to face the cold, hard reality.

-X-X-X-X-

The next time that Steve's phone rang and he saw Natasha's name on the screen, he sighed, this was another Bucky lead and he wasn't sure he could take another dead end just yet, but he took it anyway. He owed the man that much at least.

This time he'd been seen in a flea market in the centre of town. One would think that finding an ex-soldier with a metal arm in a crowd full of ordinary people would be easy… This time Steve made a calculated choice to request that all SHIELD agents leave the scene as soon as he got there. After some searching he was just beginning to lose face when something caught his eye. He saw the back of someone walking away from him in quite a hurry. His right hand was stuffed into his pants pocket but there was a definite glint in the sun. And his hair was almost shoulder-length and dark. Steve immediately set off after him.

He kept the man in his sight as he struggled through the crowd of buzzling people. His heart was pounding in his chest. Just as he was about to catch up the man suddenly stopped and took his hand out his pocket to greet another man. The hand was not metal. And as he turned towards Steve it became clear that this was indeed not Bucky. Steve felt his hope sink to his shoes. He was suddenly no longer aware of the crowd around him, so he rubbed his eyes and shook his head feebly.

"All this time following me and you're gonna give up that easily, punk?" The voice sent a sudden bolt of lightning through Steve's body. The fact that it came from a man sitting on the railing not two feet away from him did not help this situation. Steve noticed him now for the first time. He was wearing a pair of well-fitting jeans, the tell-tale, suddenly rather obvious Winter Soldier boots and a black RVCA hoody. He reached up with his metal hand in plain sight and removed the hood from his head. His long hair was slighting tussled, but smoothed back, still vaguely wet from having been washed not so long ago. Steve took a shaky breath and took a step closer. Bucky straightened himself up in a half defensive, half cautious way that told Steve to give him his space. He still looked scruffy and was sporting some stubble, but at least he looked like he was taking care of himself.

Bucky realized that Steve probably didn't know what to say to him at that point, so he continued. "I… I need to talk to you." This seemed to pull the Captain out of his stupor. "Sure. Anything you need." He said blankly. Bucky scooted himself off the railing and beckoned for Steve to follow him. He knew that even though he couldn't see Sam that the other man was probably not far from here, but for the moment he didn't seem to mind. "I've been remembering stuff." He stated blankly. An ocean of emotion was cascading around inside of him, but he found it impossible to put any of that emotion behind his words. Maybe that was a good thing though. "Like what?" Steve asked cautiously. He was obviously weary of scaring him away again.

"Can we go somewhere?" Bucky suddenly asked, out of the blue, catching even himself off guard. "I thought I'd do this in public, but I don't think that's a good idea anymore…" His voice trailed off.

"Sure man. Whatever you need." Steve assured him, he sounded relieved at the suggestion as well. "My place?" He added hesitantly. Bucky nodded. It probably wasn't the best idea strategically, but he knew he could fight his way out of just about any situation if push came to shove. Yet, all of a sudden at being face to face with Steve he felt a lot less uncertain about whether he could trust the man. He found himself wanting to trust him.

Once in Steve's apartment – not the floor in Stark Tower, but the apartment he had kept as a haven away from SHIELD – Bucky seemed to relax a little more. Steve did not fail to notice how his friend's eyes darted about the place, subconsciously identifying escape routes and possible weapons, and corners to avoid. Steve offered him coffee, which he was grateful to accept, maybe it would calm him down if he needed to relax, thus far he seemed to be doing alright though.

He sat silently at the kitchen counter as Steve made the coffee. It was only when he took the coffee from Steve that he sighed and looked up at the anxious blond man on the other side of the counter. "You used to be smaller." Bucky said vacantly. Steve nodded. "I was part of an experiment to create a super soldier. Guess they succeeded…" Steve explained. Bucky found himself understanding that 'they' referred to the military, or something like that, and the story seemed familiar, so he accepted it.

"And we were friends, right?" Steve nodded, he was visibly disappointed at the question, but he wasn't about to back down now. Whatever Bucky needed he would give to him without hesitation. Bucky picked up the coffee cup with his metal hand, automatically. When he breathed in the rich aroma, expecting it to be deeply soothing as it had been in the past he was, instead met by the same empty feeling he had been trying to avoid.

He put it back down without taking a sip. "She could kill a man with coffee." He said softly as he stared into the distance, deeply saddened by the sudden intrusion of the words that came from his lips so automatically that he only realized he'd said them out loud after they were already there. Steve seemed frozen to the spot. His face was composed but his eyes gave away the sudden turmoil the statement had delved him into. _So it wasn't just me_, Bucky thought to himself. "So she was real?" He whispered the question more than asked it. Steve nodded as he shifted in his seat and cleared his throat. "Yeah, she was real."

"How long, how long were we… together?" Bucky croaked out, his voice felt like it was going away, shrinking back into the darker corners of his mind.

"Seven years almost to the day. You dated for two years and you were engaged for five." Steve answered.

Steve was more than a little shocked when a tear spilled from his friend's eye. He expected Bucky to be more guarded than this, but he was grateful and relieved that there was still a degree of humanity left in him. "I've been trying to piece everything together. Trying to remember what she was like, but everything is so… broken. It's in a million pieces and I don't know where to start to put it back together. But I remember… I remember the feeling. The way I felt with her. And now it's gone and it's just empty. I keep thinking that I left her like that. I walked away and I didn't come back. I left her alone in this god forsaken fucking world! I left her alone to go on without me and now she's gone… She's gone." He couldn't stop the words from coming and even though he knew that the pain in his chest was unbearable it did not allow him to cry outright.

"She wouldn't have had it any other way, Buck." He looked questioningly at Steve. Had the man lost his mind? "You two, you had a way… A type of silent agreement. You both wanted the best out of life, you wanted to go far and fast. I honestly never heard her complain about your military career, not ever. She was never anything but encouraging and supportive. And you were the same with her and her medical career. She started as a nurse and ended as a surgeon. I told her that I wished you hadn't gone out with me that day, after you… after you fell. She said that I was being unreasonable. Quality of life over quantity, she said. 'I'd rather he die doing what he believes in and what he loves than giving it all up for a long life that means less to him, and by god he'd have done the same for me.' Those were her exact words, I'll never forget it." Steve explained.

This new knowledge seemed to warm him a little as he recognized the familiarity of the concept. He began to drink his coffee then, but he was still deeply sad. "How did she die?" He asked after a few moments of much needed silence.

Steve stiffened slightly at the question. He had dreaded it since the beginning of this conversation. In truth he had only learned the answer himself recently. He hadn't really dared to ask after he woke up, but the report was in the files that Natasha had released to the world.

"After you fell she was granted special permission from the president to become a field medic. She was stationed close to where we had been initially. There was an air strike… No survivors. That was when she was 26. She died doing what she loved too." It killed him to tell Bucky this, especially now, but he would not deny him the truth.

That was it. After that Bucky turned the conversation towards his history with Steve. He was open to a degree of what he remembered about his friend, but never alluded into anything that was done to him either by Zola when he was initially captured, or by HYDRA during the Winter Soldier programme. After about 2 hours of reminiscing and some stringent clarification on timelines and such Bucky left, with the promise of not disappearing again, on the condition that Steve keep SHIELD well and truly away from him, at least for the time being.

That night Bucky dreamt of her death, and nothing else…

-X-X-X-X-

In the weeks that followed Steve and Bucky met up a few times to touch base. They started to become more comfortable in each other's presence again and thus more of Bucky's memory of their friendship began to return. Steve helped him piece together some of the fragments of the earlier days. Despite all the progress Steve knew that Bucky was making he was frustrated by the fact that he never spoke of anything that was done to him. Whenever Steve would bring it up, or try and turn the conversation in that direction Bucky would close up or simply say he'd have to leave. Maybe all he needed was time.

They did not speak of Amaryne again. Steve didn't dare bring her up, but he also didn't fail to notice when Bucky stopped talking in a specific direction because he was getting close to a part where she was involved.

Steve kept up his end of the bargain and kept SHIELD away from Bucky, he at least held a bit of sway over what was left of the organization. Bucky eventually decided he wanted to meet Sam as Steve kept talking about him. The meeting went better than expected and Bucky soon decided that Sam wasn't so dodgy after all.

It wasn't long before Steve and Sam were called for another mission, however. This time, at least it was one close to home and not all that risky.

It's not every day that Captain America gets called out for a hostage situation in a coffee shop, but as soon as he got there it was obvious why he had been called. A group of rebels had held up the family of a foreign delegate in LA and they were packing some serious fire power. The negotiations went well up until a point when the perps became frustrated with the negotiator and decided to cut communications. Now no one had any idea what was going on inside the building and the situation was becoming desperate. Just as the negotiator was speaking to Nick Fury about bringing SHIELD agents or maybe even Captain America and Falcon into the situation all hell broke loose. Suddenly a bomb went off in the crowd of people who had gathered behind the police blockade. People scattered everywhere and the urgency of the situation became fragmented between the hostage situation and the dozens of injured people behind the barricade. Chaos ensued.

Captain America and Falcon were sent into the coffee shop to extract the hostages by force while Hawkeye and Black Widow went to assist with the injured civilians. Where most people had scattered, others had remained to help where they can in a show of true patriotism and camaraderie. In all the chaos some gunshots rang out from the coffee shop a few yards away and before Natasha had fully realized what was going on Clint collapsed next to her, clutching at his bleeding chest.

From what she could tell in her state of panic he seemed to have taken a bullet to the chest which collapsed his lung. In all the haze of blood and chaos there was little Natasha could do for him except send for help, which she was not sure would make it back in time. At some point in the madness Steve appeared next to her and assured her that help was on its way. The area, however, was as yet not exactly safe for civilians.

"We have to move him!" Natasha insisted. "He's going to die if we don't get him to safety!"

"If we move him now he's gonna die anyway! And safety is a hell of a long way off Natasha." Steve answered firmly, it was a bad situation.

All the while as they were arguing over Clint who was by now turning blue from being unable to breathe properly from his collapsed lung, they were unaware of the fact that they were being watched. The figure shifted slowly from where it sat, hands wrapped tightly around a man's bleeding throat. As the man drew his last staggering breath the hands slowly relinquished its hold as the figure made a decision that would, once again, change the course of the rest of its life. But hey, a change was well overdue… The figure made its way over to the scene, clutching a go-bag full of medical supplies.

"Move!" She said shoving Natasha aside. In a split second, almost too fast even for Steve to react, the woman who just came out of nowhere slammed her fist down on Clint's chest as if she was hitting him. Just as Natasha drew her gun on the unnamed woman Clint took a gasping breath that sounded a hell of a lot better than his previous attempts. When Natasha looked down at him she noticed that the woman had actually slammed a needle into his chest, which in turn inflated the collapsed lung. Her precision was flawless, as always. Natasha looked back at the woman with a shocked, but utterly relieved look on her face screaming unspoken gratitude; she knelt down next to the fallen agent who was now regaining his composure and his colour.

Steve stood there frozen to his spot, staring blankly at the woman who so suddenly appeared out of nowhere, like a memory from a dream. She did not meet his gaze at first, instead she looked down at her patient. She then knelt down and began to check him for any other injuries. Once she was satisfied she stood back up again with a sigh before finally meeting the Captain's baffled gaze.

"You know anabolic steroids are bad for you, right?" She asked him, the tease in her voice was as strong as ever, but the glint in her eyes told him that she was just reaffirming his unbelievable suspicion.

"Louise?" He breathed.

"How many times do I have to tell you, Rogers? Only my grandmother calls me that." She scoffed.

-X-X-X-X-

Fury slid the file across the steel table at her where she sat, one arm around the back of the chair at a strange angle, her black hair still tied up wildly behind her head. Her clothes were covered in blood, but most of the blood on her hands and her face and neck had been washed off. She reached out and opened the file to the first page, her delicate features completely expressionless.

"Doctor Adelaide Kane." Fury said, annoyance playing at his usually composed voice. She looked up at him from below her sharp eyebrows. "Or should I call you Adeline Bowman? Lots of connotations to make from that one. Or Lina Hoitte? Or, what was that one from Louisianna? That was my favourite; Anna-Louise Buchanan." He paused. "Or should I use the name your mother gave you? Amaryne Louise Hale?" The name hung like a heavy smog in the room, threatening to choke the inhabitants at any moment.

"You could always revert to the one you are actually interested in. What was it again, remind me Rogers? Oh yeah! Louis Atelier Hale." She stated sarcastically, eliciting a disapproving shake of the head from Steve.

"Wait a minute!" Banner protested from where he stood, minding his own business up until then. "Louis Hale as in the doctor Louis A. Hale who designed Steve's serum?"

Amy scowled at Bruce. "It's not Steve's serum, its Dr. Esken's serum, he pitched the idea. And yes, Louis Atelier Hale was a pseudonym that my chauvinistic colleagues used for me to hide the fact that a woman happened to be the one who patented their precious super jizz." The sarcasm she was capable of was legendary and so was her sharp tongue and her disregard for social standards. Steve found himself glad that this hadn't changed.

"What I'm more interested in, Doctor Hale, is why you are still here?" Fury pressed, taking Banner out of the equation before the doctor lost his cool.

Amy scoffed. "Because Germans are assholes and Americans have their heads up their asses."

"Listen sister, if you're gonna play this game with me you better know what you're doing." Fury said as he placed his hands on the table in front of her. Steve didn't like that, he didn't like it all, but she didn't seem to flinch. On the contrary, she leaned forward. "You arrogant little snot. Didn't anyone ever teach you to respect your elders? Rogers over here might have spent the last 70 years as a star spangled ice crystal, but I've been around. I've seen and done a hell of a lot more than you have, and I sure as shit know a lot more about the world than you do. So I'd check my tone if I were you." She all but sneered. This made Fury do a bit of a double take. He was not expecting this level of animosity from another one of America's great heroes. "I'm trying to help you." Fury said cautiously. "Then stop threatening me." She gave back.

"Before we can do anything we're going to need some collateral information from you." Natasha explained, deciding that she'd seen enough cock fighting for one day. "Even with access to all your aliases there is still very little known about you. We need to know what you've been doing, what you were involved in, who might be following you. And we need information on the serum and its side effects, you two aren't the only ones it's been used on and there have been some… complications." Natasha hesitated. "At the end of the day we just want to make sure that your hands are clean and that we aren't in danger in our contact with you."

"Natasha, I like you. Don't lie to me." She looked at Steve who averted his eyes quickly. "You have all of that information already. You want two things from me; firstly, you want me fix the fuck-up doctor Banner over here inflicted on himself, secondly, you probably want me to hand over whatever other juicy projects I've been working on, most likely you will try to do this either by recruiting me or by forcing me, both of which are going to prove to be excessively difficult. But the real reason why I'm here, and the real reason why you're all so… twitchy, is because you're hiding something from me." She let that hang in the air for a moment. "I will help Banner, no problem, although I'm quite sure he won't like what I have to say to him. And I will let you in on my projects on a few simple terms, I honestly have nothing to hide. If the world wants to use my work to screw itself over, then by all means. As for what you're hiding from me; I couldn't care less. There isn't a god damn thing in the world you can hold over me that's even gonna make a dent."

"What are your terms?" Fury asked.

"Sit." She gestured to Fury, who obeyed her reluctantly.

"It depends what you want, exactly."

"What have you got?" Fury asked. She smiled.

"I will never have any official involvement with SHIELD. The first time you or any of yours try to recruit me is the last you hear from me." Fury nodded. "And you and yours stay the hell out of my involvement with Russia. It has nothing to do with you."

"Russia!?" Fury protested. "What in the hell…" She interrupted him. "What did I just say!?" This left him silent, albeit more than a little annoyed. "Anything else?" He added.

"No press. The world, at least for the time being, can remain well and truly in the dark about my existence."

"Of course" Fury assured her.

"There are things that I will not give to you. Things I will mention, but not relinquish. There are some things that the human race just doesn't need to know. And that includes things that you might think would change the world for the better, but trust me; the consequences outweigh the gain by way more than a little." She could see the frustration in his eyes, but she was adamant. "The rest we will deal with as we go along." She added.

"And if we want to know more about you?" Natasha asked.

"Read a book." Amy answered as she leaned back in her chair and put a foot on the table.

-X-X-X-X-

As much as Steve wanted to spill it all to Amy right then and there he couldn't find a way to do it. And he knew that it would be better to tell Bucky first. He hated lying to her, but he found he had little choice. He stayed behind as everyone left one by one. Once everyone had cleared out Amy let her guard down a little, letting her head fall back and sighing to herself. She was doing that a lot lately. He followed her out to the terrace to get some air.

"You have no idea how happy I am to see you, Lou." He smiled at her.

She snorted, feigning indignation at the use of her second name, but by now she knew better than to try and argue with him about it. "I suppose a familiar face is a sight for sore eyes after everything." She said as she leaned forward onto the railing. He came to stand next to her with his back to the railing and his arms crossed across his chest.

"Yeah. It was one hell of a wake-up call." Steve agreed. "Although, I'm not sure which is worse; waking up after 70 years unchanged or living for 70 years unchanged."

She breathed a laugh. "It's not so bad."

"How are you though, really?" Steve asked.

She looked out over the city with a quizzical look on her face. "Bored. I'm bored Steve."

"That's not what I meant."

She smirked. "Of course not." Then she looked at him and shook her head before reaching up and letting her hair down. The mass of black silk wisped about in the gentle wind making it look as if she was under water. "I'm alright. I mean, it sucked at first, after you went missing. I didn't see much reason to stay in the states. Nothing was keeping me here. So Howard helped me get out of dodge. I took the airstrike as an opportunity and split. I lived one hell of a life though." She looked him up and down where he stood frozen to the spot, staring into the distance. "And you? You seem sad, or worried. I can never tell which one it is with you." She pressed.

He raised an eyebrow in slight concern before clearing his throat. "I'm worried." He stated.

"About whatever it is they're hiding from me?" She ventured.

He nodded in affirmation.

"Don't suppose you'll tell me what it is then?" She inquired.

He looked at her "I can't. Not yet. I need to… There's something I need to do first." He found that he had a lump in his throat now.

She sighed, and then turned back to him. "Whatever it is Rogers, you know I'll be alright. Survival is what I do, and no matter the repercussions I will thrive again. You know that, don't you?"

He nodded, rubbing tears from his eyes. He did know that she was okay and that she probably would be. It was not in her nature to be defeated by fate. But he wasn't sure the effect it would have on Bucky or what seeing him like this would do to her.

They spent the rest of the night catching up on the last 70 years that Steve missed.

-X-X-X-X-

Amy had agreed to stay in Stark Tower while Steve left the next day. While she was there she figured she might as well entertain the new Stark model she was dealing with, seeing as she was always fond of Howard, maybe his son was worth befriending too.

Steve, on the other hand, was trying desperately to formulate the best possible way to tell Bucky that Amy was alive. A large part of him was excited to tell him, but the other half worried that it might be too much for him to deal with.

None the less, Steve called him the moment he got back to his apartment; it didn't take Bucky long to get there. He seemed more relaxed than Steve had seen him for a while. At first this reassured Steve that he could tell him, but at the same time he didn't want to ruin the mood.

"You're tense as fuck." Bucky commented as he watched Steve stare out the window. "How was the mission?" He asked suspiciously.

He'd had a good night sleep for once and hadn't had a flashback yet today so the day had been pretty good until now. "Fine. We… uh… there was a hostage situation in LA. But it all turned out alright. Clint got shot, but he's okay now." Steve stammered.

"Right." Bucky commented. "The fuck are you tiptoeing over then?"

The statement was so classically Bucky that Steve half did a double take. This was beginning to be too much for him to handle as well.

"I'm gonna tell you something. Okay? But, you gotta promise me that you're not gonna lose it." Steve said quickly, as if he was afraid he was going to lose his nerve halfway through the sentence. Bucky lifted an eyebrow.

"What did I do?" He asked.

Steve frowned in utter shock. "What? No! You didn't do anything. I just… we… I mean, just promise me you won't lose it, okay? Pace yourself, breathe, process before you freak out."

None of this was doing anything for Bucky's suspicion.

"And don't just jump up and split, either. We need to clear up how we're gonna do this so it doesn't end badly." Steve added.

"Okay… I guess." Bucky said hesitantly. By now his mind was buzzing both with worry and anticipation. Steve seemed well and truly shaken by whatever had transpired since the last time Bucky had seen him.

Steve took a deep breath and sat down on the couch next to Bucky. "When we were in LA there was a bomb that went off in the crowd of people that had gathered to view the hostage situation, so a lot of people got hurt and it was absolute chaos. And then Clint got shot and his lung collapsed. At first we thought he was gonna die because we couldn't get him to a medic in time, but there was this woman who just came out of nowhere and stuck a needle in his chest, inflating his lung, as if it was nothing. I swear to you man, I couldn't believe my fucking eyes, and I still can't quite wrap my head around it… But it's her. It's Amaryne. She's not dead; she just used the airstrike to fake her own death…"

Bucky just sat there unmoving, his quizzical expression unchanging as if he was still waiting for Steve to tell him what was going on. Slowly he turned his face away from Steve's expectant and nervous gaze. He sighed heavily and ran his right hand through his hair. "And you believe it's really her?" He asked softly.

Steve was taken aback by his calm demeanour. "Yeah. I wouldn't tell you any of this unless I was 100% sure. It's her alright."

Bucky nodded as he folded his hands in front of his face, the contrast of skin to metal seeming oddly natural in the dim light.

"She doesn't know about you though. I wanted to tell you first. Fury doesn't want to tell her at all. He's afraid it will distract her from helping him out with whatever he has in mind for her, probably something to do with Doctor Banner's condition. And, to be honest, I wasn't sure what you would want to do…" His voice trailed off towards the end.

"Is she happy?" The question was barely audible, but unmistakable. There was absolutely no doubt in Steve's mind that this was all Bucky, 100%.

"That's not the point Buck. She's okay and yeah I would say she's happy, but don't think for one second that she wouldn't want to know that you're alive." Steve insisted.

Bucky scowled at him and huffed bitterly. "The thing is though, that I'm not me anymore. This, whatever the hell it is, is _not_ who I used to be. I'm less now than I've ever been and I don't think I could _ever_ get back to where I was before! I can't go back to her like this, she's not gonna walk away, and god knows she deserves better." He said angrily.

Steve looked at him uncomprehendingly. He suddenly stood and started pacing as Steve stared at him. "So you want to keep her in the dark?" He finally asked.

Bucky stopped his pacing. "I don't know." He admitted. "I just don't want to trap her. But I…" He swallowed hard and then added with little more than a whisper; "I don't know if I can live without her." He admitted.

"Trust me, Buck. Not even you could trap her. And it's not like you need to march over there right now and confront her. Take your time." Steve let the statement hang there for a while before adding; "All I'm saying is that the only ring on her is the one you gave her. It's hanging on a chain around her neck, along with a pair of dog tags. And I would bet my left leg that those are yours too."

-X-X-X-X-

For the next two days Bucky was in a daze. He didn't know up from down and instead of having flashbacks he had nothing. His mind seemed empty. He didn't want to cry, or scream, or laugh, or sleep, or anything. He felt like he was falling and there was nothing that was going to catch him. As he was lying on the bed one night, metal hand behind his head and the other one resting on his chest he tried to remember that last time he saw her.

It wasn't a significant goodbye, he remembered that much, on the contrary, it was the same as most of them had been. There was no promise of return, or advice to stay safe. She'd told him to watch out for Steve, just to mess with the Captain, and then they parted with a hug like always, and that was it. It seemed so menial. But it made him wonder about something else.

Steve had spoken about a 'silent agreement' maybe it wasn't silent? Maybe they just never spoke to him about it. He closed his eyes and tried to focus on what he could remember about before he'd gone to war, the nights she had spent sitting on the porch, those early days before they'd known much about death and everything else the world had to offer. What made him enlist in the first place? Pearl Harbour. That was it. He enlisted after the Pearl Harbour bombing, she was already in university, he thought.

But how did she react when he enlisted? What did she say?

"You're being ridiculous." The words came suddenly and unexpectedly, like one of his flashbacks, but this time he didn't shy away from it or try to fight it.

"What's that supposed to mean?" He asked.

"Why would I freak out about that?" She asked as she switched the kettle on.

"Because it's the army, babe. I'll go to war." He explained, almost flustered.

"No shit." She stated.

He groaned. "Would you rather sit on your ass here and wait for me to finish med-school? Work in your father's garage for the rest of your life?" She asked.

"No." He said flatly.

"Then enlist, Jamie. Do what you want. Don't ever hold back on your life for my sake. Please." She said earnestly.

"What kind of girl are you?" He asked with a ridiculous smirk on his face.

"The rational kind." She smiled back before kissing the smile on his face.

The memory faded into a later memory. This time they were in the city, there was noise outside the window and she was chopping something in the kitchen. He sat at the table, watching her and sipping coffee.

"I'm shipping out next week." He said, staring into the mug.

"Where?" She asked, distracted by her chopping.

"Germany." He answered expectantly. She put whatever she was chopping into a pan.

"That's frontline, isn't it?" She asked as she dug into a cupboard next to the stove, pulling out another pan.

"Yup." He answered.

"What did Steve say about that?" She asked, running water into the pan.

"I haven't told him yet." He admitted.

"I can't imagine he will take it well." She said, raising her eyebrows.

"Me neither." Bucky agreed, still waiting for something from her. "Babe." He said.

"Hmm?" She hummed in response, when she was in this cooking zone of hers it took a hell of a lot to break her concentration.

"What if I don't come back?" He asked frankly.

She looked down at him then, putting down what she was fussing with.

"James, what is this about?" She asked, now coming to sit next to him at the table.

"I'm just saying, Rain. I don't plan on dying, but this is war, babe. There is a chance I might not come back."

She tucked a strand of black hair behind her ear and laced the fingers of her right hand with his left which was lying on the table.

"You could walk out this door tomorrow morning and a truck could hit you. Or you could have an aneurism we don't know about and drop dead right here, right now. Or you could be just fine and live a long life and we would get married and grow old together and you would spend the rest of your life wondering. Wondering what more you could have done. Or you can ship out next week and do what you believe in. You could fight for something you believe in, live your life to the fullest, be the best possible version of yourself. And yes, you might die out there. And if you die it will hurt, like hell, for a long time, but it would be exactly as it was meant to be. I don't want to force you to go, but I don't want to be the reason for you not going either. If you want to stay, then stay, but do it for yourself. In the end, I will be okay. I have my own dreams to chase down. No matter what, I promise you that if something happens out there and you don't come back, I will be okay. I'll find a way to be okay. You've done so much for me. You've put up with all the cold nights and the long hours and all my babbling about medical crap and all my fights with the APA and University, it's your turn now. I'm in a good place, I've done more than I ever thought possible and it's a great feeling. I want you to have that same feeling, without having to worry about me." She reached up with the other hand and cupped his cheek. "I will be here when you get back. I'll always be here. No matter what. I'm not going anywhere. And in the end I will see you again. One way or another, when the time is right and you are ready, I'll be here. Okay?"

He reached out to her and pulled her into his lap and hugged her tight in an embrace that felt like it was supposed to last forever.

"What did I do to deserve you?" He whispered into her ear as he kissed her temple.

"I have no idea. But whatever it was, it must have been god-awful" She quipped.

He couldn't help but laugh.

For the first time in decades Bucky woke up without a start and without any fear or uncertainty. He hadn't realized that he'd fallen asleep, but now it was dark out. His mind was clear and he was at peace. He knew what he was supposed to do. He'd never been more certain about anything else in his life, and that was saying a lot.

-X-X-X-X-

Steve was not surprised to find Amaryne in a lab with Tony Stark, messing with some his gadgets, 80's rock blaring in the background and empty beer bottles everywhere. She used to do the same thing with Howard.

"Elvis." Tony said, pointing a piece of metal at her. She was dressed in a long sleeve black see-through jersey, of sort, with only a bra underneath, which didn't shock the Captain all that much, and a pair of torn jean shorts, barefoot, as usual.

She laughed at Tony as took a swig of beer. "Bad kisser." She stated.

Tony made a face and threw his arms up. "Figures. Who else? Oh I know! James Dean!"

"Fucking high. All. The. Time. I didn't even bother."

"What? No! Come on!" Tony protested. "Fine. What about Frank Sinatra?"

"Not her type." Steve interjected.

Tony moved his sunglasses down his nose and judged the Captain over the rim of the shades, disapprovingly. Then he turned back to Amy. "Steve Rogers?" He asked pointing at Steve.

"Fuck no!" Amy protested vehemently. "Scrawny little bastard from Brooklyn who didn't know how to pick a fight? No thank you."

Steve had to laugh at that idea. He had most definitely _not_ been her type. Although, come to think of it, neither was Bucky. Amy had two types; arrogant rich bastards, kind of like Tony, or road hardened bikers her father's age.

"No Stark, she liked them either old, or rich." Steve said, just to annoy Tony.

"And Sergeant Barnes was which of the two?" Tony asked, now looking at her over his shades.

Steve's heart leapt to his throat.

"No, no, no. That's not how it works Tony. The only way you can ever be sure that someone is absolutely right for you is if you can't understand why you love them. 'Cause if you can explain to me why you love someone, then it's not real. Anything you pinpoint as a reason can be taken away. So you love the idea of them. There's a difference." She stated with an unimpeded smile on her face.

Tony said nothing to that, he just huffed. "What do you want Capcicle? We're having a very important business meeting."

Amy burst out laughing at that and reached over to high-five Tony.

"Nice! Nice. I like that." She said as she took the last swig of beer.

"Discussing her little black book is considered an important business meeting now?" Steve asked amused.

"Of course, Rogers. All is fair in love and war." Amy insisted draping an arm around his shoulders. "What did I tell you about taking life so _seriously_?" She asked.

"I need to talk to you." He said, ignoring her question. He knew the answer all too well, but now was _not_ the time to be messing around.

She turned to look at Tony and shook her head contemptuously.

"Of course you do." She said as she slapped Steve on the back and padded over to the terrace again.

He followed her, bidding Tony farewell.

"Have you heard of the Winter Soldier?" Steve asked once they were out in the open air and out of earshot of Tony.

She snorted and rolled her eyes. "That shit again? Of course I've heard of the Winter Soldier. One of HYDRA's failed experiments, that. I mean, the concept was flawless, in and of itself, but he changed hands too many times. And HYDRA stuffed up the original concept to hell and gone anyway."

"How so?" She seemed to know a lot more about it than Steve thought she would, which concerned him.

"Well, firstly, they took some dude who was half dead already and decided to start the programme on him. You can't exactly cognitively recalibrate someone with amnesia. It fucks things up because they don't always know how to pick up on operant cues. And he was one of the 107th, so Zola had his hands on him first and lord alone knows what that oil stain of a Swiss did to him. And to top it all off the Germans started the process wrong to begin with. You don't go straight into wiping the slate. You have to build a foundation first. But of course, once HYDRA fell and the Russians got their hands on the project things started to go better. They used the reinforcement methods I designed for their training programmes. That worked out pretty well, it all started to come together, despite the toss up start. But then, of course, Chekov decides to contract a serious case of shit-for-brains and hands the project over to your friend Pierce, for no apparent reason. Too much rain and snow, if you'd ask me. But anyway. Pierce fucked up the entire situation. He had no clue what he was doing. The reinforcements started to fail almost immediately so he started wiping every 3 weeks which damaged the neural networks, so his reflexes and training would fail. The only thing Pierce could do to prevent that was to stick him in Cryo for extended periods of time, hence the name. But that's a dumbass idea, 'cause eventually intrusion starts to happen, and when you have intrusion you have doubt and doubt calls for a loose cannon. And that's one hell of a loose cannon."

Steve didn't follow exactly what she was talking about. She always had a tendency to let her technical jargon run wild when she was passionate about something.

"So you helped create him?" He asked for clarification, hoping beyond hope that his inference was wrong.

"Not exactly. I just consulted on it. The Russians valued my input on their training regimes. Both for voluntary and involuntary service. So you could say that the greater part of his maintenance came from me, indirectly, but I didn't actually have anything to do with his programming. They just used the methods I designed to try and compensate for the mistakes made by HYDRA." She explained.

Steve stared at her for a few moments. He was slightly taken aback by just how much she knew about this. It pissed him off that she knew so much but did nothing to… Wait, now he wasn't too sure that she truly didn't know who she was talking about. What if she _does_ know who she is talking about?

"You knew he was from the 107th and you still helped the Russians fuck with his mind?" Steve snapped. He didn't necessarily mean to snap, but he wasn't happy about this. Not in the slightest.

"There were 400 men in the 107th, I had a personal connection with _one_ of them 15 years prior to when the Russians asked for my input on the Winter Soldier. And James was dead, according to _you_, so I didn't have all that much to worry about." She said sternly. Her tone was not lost on the Captain. He looked away, suddenly ashamed at his anger towards her. She was right, she had no reason to doubt that this was just another number in a file.

Amy had, to date, not attempted to hide the fact that she had been involved in less than savoury acts during her time in Russia. It was part of the reason she was such an exceptional medical mind. Amy had spent a long time before the war explaining the various ethical issues associated with modern medicine to Steve, he understood the fine line and he trusted that she did what she did for the greater good. But it was horrific none the less.

"What's the problem, Rogers?" She asked.

He said nothing, rather, he turned away from her. This really was beyond him.

"Who is the Winter Soldier, Rogers? What interest do you have in him?" She asked again, not moving from her spot.

Still he said nothing. He was trying to formulate a way to break it to her without shattering the thin ice he had just walked out on. Sure, Bucky had said that it was better she knew about him, after two days of Steve not hearing from him at all, but now the prospect of telling her wasn't exactly a happy occasion anymore.

"Does he have something to do with you're trying to hide from me?" Damn she was good… Steve nodded once, turning back to her, his heart was trying to climb out his throat.

"So are you going to tell me what's so great about him that he has to be hidden? What, is his programming failing? Do you want me to reinforce it? Is he working for Fury now? What the fuck is so terrible about this?" She pressed. These were questions Steve felt he could answer, at the very least.

"He's not working for Fury. I'm keeping SHIELD the hell away from him. And no, I don't want you to reinforce his programming. Yes it is failing… And I've done what I can. But you… He needs you. Maybe he doesn't realize just how much, and maybe he didn't come here himself because he didn't want… because he didn't want you to feel pressured into getting involved." This was honestly the best Steve could do at this point. He just couldn't bring himself to say it to her outright. Not now, not like this.

Amy stared at him blankly. Her face betrayed nothing about what was going on inside of her, this made Steve even more nervous.

"What's he to me then?" She finally asked. Her tone was unchanged from the previous statement. Steve was defeated. She was too hesitant to believe him to make this inference on her own, and he didn't blame her.

"Damnit Lou, do you really want me to say it?" He begged haplessly as she stared at him coldly.

"Yes Steve. Whatever it is, just say it." She chose her words wisely as the memory came flooding back to him. That was exactly the statement from her that had drawn a confession of his death from Steve all those years ago. And here they were again, in a sick twist of fate.

"It's Bucky. The Winter Soldier is Bucky. I was wrong. Obviously whatever Zola did to him made him survive the fall." The statement hung in the air between them like poisonous gas.

"And you expect me to believe this?" She said coldly.

"Would I lie about this?!" He demanded in retort.

"Well you sure as shit lied about something! Either he's dead or he's not. Which one is it?" She snapped.

"He's alive, okay. He's alive. I spoke to him 6 hours ago. He tried to kill me on a bridge a few months ago and almost succeeded. He's alive. Long hair, metal arm, same blue eyes. What more do you want from me? I was wrong…"

"I trusted you." Amy whispered, now obviously fighting tears. The statement hit him in the chest like a ton of bricks. She didn't wait for a response. She just stormed past him and staggered out the door. He thought it best not to follow her. They both needed time to process right now.

-X-X-X-X-

"She didn't take it well, did she?" Bucky asked as he watched Steve pace up and down in the living room.

"At first she didn't believe me. But now she's pissed. She said she trusted me and that I'd lied. God knows I don't blame her. But I don't know where she went. She stormed off. I'm kind of worried about her." Steve admitted. He knew that her words had been said in anger, but it was unlike her to react so brashly, even in anger.

"I think I might know where the find her." Bucky said as he made his way to the door. He seemed strangely calm about the whole thing. Steve decided not to question it.

And just like that Steve Rogers was left alone with his thoughts as two sides of the same coin set out to find itself again.

-X-X-X-X-

Bucky let his instinct lead him. He hadn't done that in a while since he wasn't always sure he could trust his instincts, some of it might still be programming, either way, at this point he would even turn to his programming to find her. Maybe the last 70 years of his life wouldn't be so wasted. He was surprised and a little concerned that he wasn't nervous. All he knew was that he was worried about her. He needed to find her and make sure she was okay. And find her he did, much to his own surprise. Even after telling Steve that he might know where she was, he was going completely on his gut, so he didn't dare to believe that she would actually be there… Sitting on the pier railing staring out over the ocean. Her long black hair was loose and whipping in the ocean breeze and her feet were still bare, but that was nothing new. He approached her slowly, but with a calculated degree of determination. Stopping a few feet from her he just looked at her for a moment. His entire world was calm, eerily so.

"It's not his fault." He said softly. Maybe not the most romantic thing to say to his fiancé who'd believed him dead for the past 70 years, but it was the issue at hand, the designated mission…

"I know." She whispered, barely audible, but his enhanced hearing made it easy for him to hear. Then she added. "I shouldn't have done that to him." This time with a little more volume.

"It's not your fault either." He offered. This made her look at him. He noted that she hadn't been crying, which in his mind was a good thing. She smiled sadly. "I'm trying to know that."

He stepped closer to her now as she swung her legs back over his side of the railing and pushed herself to her feet so she was standing in front of him. One would think that there would be a lot of years and a lot of questions between them, but in that moment there was nothing… Nothing at all. Amy reached up and ran her fingers through his long hair, pulling it away from his face, then she smiled. He smiled back at her, the same certainty he'd had last night was back. This is exactly as it should be.

"I didn't think you'd still be here." He said softly.

"You idiot. I said I'd be here when you get back. Didn't I?" This time there were tears running down her cheeks, but he knew these were not bad tears. He enveloped her in his arms. Vaguely wondering if the metal arm would bother her, but when she buried her face in his right shoulder without a second thought he stopped worrying. They stayed that way for a good long while, before deciding that they should probably go back and make sure the Captain hadn't climbed out of his skin yet.


	2. PART 2: Something to Hold on to

AN: once again, I am aware that I am claiming a lot of creative right with this one. The story about the Hulk is not accurate, the factions of the KGB, Red Room and my own creation: Unit 37 is not canon, etc.

Please let me know if I need to add a chapter explaining my reasoning for Bucky's quick recovery from the devastating news (and perhaps my whole reasoning behind his recovery… Just for interests sake… up to you guys)

R&amp;R if you like!

Once again, OC centric at times, now also Bucky centric. Warning: mention of sex, but nothing explicit.

I also want an opinion: If there is enough merit I am more than willing on continuing with more detail in this story. At present moment I am rushing it because I just want it out of my head. But there is a LOT more to it than this. So please review if you want it to continue. There might still be a part 3, but if you want more, just shout.

**PART 2: Something to hold on to**

"Your face is going to stay that way." Amy's voice startled Steve back into reality. He had been staring into space with a concerned frown for more than half an hour.

"Sorry." He mumbled.

She scoffed. "It does nothing to me."

"How are you holding up?" He asked, distracted again.

She scowled at him. "A lot better than you, evidently."

"I'm serious." He insisted, annoyed by her nonchalance.

She sighed. "What do you want me to say?" She asked as she sat down beside him. "Not everything in life can be easy, Rogers. It's gonna take a while for him to get his bearings back. And you have to admit, regardless of how different he is, it's pretty damn nice to have him back."

"I was worried he'd be too different for you." Steve ventured.

She smiled then. "Nah. He's still in there somewhere. And all we have is time. So I'm just glad he's not doing it alone anymore. Between the two of us I'm sure we make one hell of a buffer-shock for reality, don't you think?"

Steve smiled, earnestly. He was relieved that everything was going so well now, although he was cautious about it too, something had to give eventually.

They sat on the balcony of Steve's apartment in silence for a while before Bucky appeared in the doorway. He leaned against the sliding door and sipped at his coffee. Now that Amy was making it again he seemed to drink far too much of it, but Steve was not prepared to argue about it.

"What are you two conniving?" Bucky asked tiredly. He still wasn't sleeping properly.

"The state of Rogers's nerves, as it were." Amy smiled slyly.

Bucky scoffed and extended the mechanical arm to her. He'd noticed that, in her own strange way, she seemed to like the hunk of scrap metal. She stood up and buried herself into his arms.

"What're you so nervous about, punk?" He asked, still holding on to her.

"You two." Steve admitted. He could not help but smile at the insertion of the nickname. Bucky had done it before, but this was the first time that it was unconsciously done.

"I thought it was my job to worry about you." Bucky objected light-heartedly.

"Seriously? I think after everything, I am entitled to at least a little bit of recognition."

"Why? You still don't know how to pick your fights." Bucky snorted.

Steve laughed and shook his head. Since Amy had showed up he's started joking about being the Winter Soldier. This reference to his fight with Steve was nothing new. It had taken quite some getting used to for the Captain. He also started talking about facing Fury at some point. At least he was making some progress. But Bucky was far from alright, still.

"I think we need to get your cyborg ass to bed, babe." Amy stated as she watched him yawn again. It was late, the night was nippy and dark already. He did not argue with her, maybe he needed sleep, no matter how restless it would be.

It had not taken much for the Soldier to leave the motel room he had been staying in for Amy's lavish hotel room. Granted it felt strange as hell for him to be in such luxury, he didn't mind much. The blackout curtains helped him sleep and she was there with him, so he wasn't complaining. The first night they had spent together here he could not sleep at all. She had fallen asleep in his arms and he eventually got up and sat in an armchair next to the bed, just watching her sleep. To his relief he realized that when she was in the bed with him he did not thrash around like he did when he slept alone, but he pulled a gun on the wall several times, which did little for his confidence in his ability to stop himself from accidentally shooting her in one of his fits. It didn't take long for Bucky to become frustrated with his slow progress. He'd imagined that he would progress faster with Amy back in his life, but he felt like his progress had slowed to a crawl.

"Rain?" He said, staring at the ceiling while she lulled between sleep and consciousness with her head in the crook of his right shoulder. His metal arm was folded up under the pillow under his head.

"Hmm?" She hummed sleepily. Where he had been dead tired when they got back he was wide awake now.

"Don't you ever get scared?" He asked. At first he had hesitated with such questions, but she insisted on them, as asking would help his recovery. All in all he knew that she was sort of an expert on this business, so he relinquished his resistance easily enough. It felt wrong to rely on her the way he was, but he noticed that she was holding on to that reliance as much as he was.

"Scared of what?" She mumbled, a little more awake now.

"Of me."

This made her prop herself up on an elbow with an eyebrow raised to chastising heights. "What the fuck for?" She demanded, more playfully than anything else. Surely she knew where this was going.

"It's an honest question." He objected. "I'm not always at my full wits when I wake up like that. And the Winter Soldier is still in there. What if I shoot you? Or choke you? Or something." He wasn't nervous or angry, just curious. She seemed to have logical answers to these conundrums that made him a little less worried about them, and she didn't deny the possibilities that were logically sound, so he felt he could trust her to be honest about it.

Her expression changed to a more contemplative state. "Well, the chances of that happening are slim, but I hear you." She stated before continuing in a pensive manner. "Honestly, there's a lot I can do to make you snap out of it. So I'm not worried about choking, and even if you do that then it's gonna take a lot to actually hurt me, I took the serum too, remember? And as for the shooting, seeing as you don't shoot the walls and you always seem to actively assess the situation the few times you _have_ pointed the gun at me, I sincerely doubt you would shoot to kill. Don't get me wrong; I'm not all that eager to take a bullet for your delirious ass, but it wouldn't be the end of the world."

Its times like these that Bucky wasn't sure whether he wanted to kick her ass or kiss her.

"What if I do kill you?"

"I won't let you. I promise." It was a tentative promise as she considered it carefully. Bucky had realised by now that there were some rules in their relationship which he didn't think was anything new. One of these rules seemed to be that they don't make promises they can't keep. This was a huge comfort to him as he found that it was far easier to trust her words when he knew she wasn't going to give him false hope, or say something just because she thought that was what he wanted to hear.

He said nothing to that, there was nothing to say, he just pulled her down back onto his shoulder.

She yawned. "Get some sleep. You can shoot me tomorrow."

Oddly enough he had to laugh at that. Her view of the world, as twisted as it was, seemed to comfort the broken pieces of his mind. He felt as if he couldn't really do anything that would horrify her, and that was more than someone like him could ever ask for.

It was the first time that week that he got some sleep. It was only in the small hours of the morning that he awoke, but not violently or with a start as he was used to. He woke up groggy and slowly, distantly aware of something. As Bucky attempted to focus his mind he realized what was going on. Amy was mumbling in her sleep. At first he couldn't make out what she was saying, but as his head cleared he made out a few muted words, and then found he wished he hadn't listened. She was repeating something. He caught the words 'say it', 'dead', and 'Barnes'… The way she was saying it seemed uncharacteristic; needy and panicked.

"Rain." He whispered, rubbing her cheek. As soon as her eyes snapped open they searched his face. There was a pain there he hadn't noticed before, an urgency. For a moment she seemed shocked and disoriented, but then she reached out to him suddenly and pulled herself close to his chest. Their legs intertwined and he folded his arms around her, he could feel her shaking. He noticed then that she was crying.

"Are you okay?" He whispered into her hair. He wasn't sure what to do about this, usually he was the one clinging to her.

She hugged him tighter, but nodded. "Yeah. It happens." She finally said, but her voice still sounded small. For the moment he just held on to her until she had stopped shaking. Then she finally turned around, but he still kept his arms around her. She held on to both of them, completely unaffected by the mechanical arm, sometimes he sincerely doubted that she even noticed the fact that it was metal.

"What was that about?" He inquired once he was sure she was calm.

She sighed and whispered. "The usual. You, falling."

He groaned. "I'm sorry."

She huffed. "It's not your fault."

"Well… technically…"

"You know what I mean, Bee."

X-X-X-X-X

"Do you really think that's a good idea?" Steve asked quizzically as Amy sat on his kitchen counter waiting for the kettle to boil.

"I don't see why not."

Steve shook his head. "What makes you think it's a good idea for Bucky to just march into Stark Tower and start playing twenty questions with Fury? He's not ready!" Steve protested.

"I'm pretty sure that's for him to decide."

"I'm right here." Bucky interjected. He was standing with his arms crossed over his chest next to the counter.

"I don't like it. You don't know what Fury is like. He's gonna want to know everything, and he won't take no for an answer." Steve maintained.

"I know that. But I don't see the point in sitting around here waiting for the grass to grow, Steve."

"So you're willing to put it all at risk because you're bored?"

Bucky shook his head and ran his hand through his hair. "I'm not going to sit around here doing nothing when I can give the world some answers. And yeah, it's not gonna be fun, I get that. But I'm not some porcelain doll whose gonna break at any moment either. At some point I need to face reality."

Steve sighed and shook his head. "Fine. Whatever. Just make sure Fury doesn't pull on strings that don't need pulling." He said pointing a finger at Amy accusingly. She smirked at him and eyed Bucky.

X-X-X-X-X

Rogers was not wrong about Fury. He asked a lot of questions and demanded answers pretty adamantly. But you can only smash your head against a brick wall so many times before you start to get dizzy. For once the Soldier thanked fuck for his programming. There wasn't much that Nick Fury could do to intimidate him.

"What is it with you two? Huh?" Fury asked, defiantly as he looked up at Amy after an hour of butting his head on blank stares or clicking of metal fingers from the Winter Soldier in front of him. "Can't you throw a guy a bone?"

"We'll throw, eventually." Amy admitted. "Patience is a virtue, kid."

This drew an amused chuckle from Bucky, finally softening his icy stare. "Maybe you just don't ask the right questions." He added.

"That pretty much amounts to the same thing the doctor, over here, told me months ago. Right after she promised to spill some important beans. Then you showed up and this is the first I've seen of her since." Fury remarked.

"Well then let's get started!" Amy chirped. "Where's Banner?"

"Banner? Why start with him?" Fury questioned.

"Because the last thing you want is a big green blotch on the side of Stark Tower. A showdown between the Hulk and the Winter Soldier is _not_ on my 'things to see before I die' list." She gave back carelessly.

Bucky was entirely unscathed by this. Fury put his palm over his face and shook his head. "God help me with these people." He mumbled to himself.

X-X-X-X-X

"Why exactly do you think I'm going to start a fight with James?" Bruce inquired as Amy stuck the needle into his arm with expert precision.

"That's not what I said."

"Well then, what is it?"

"It's kind of hard to explain, really. Your personalities are strangely similar at present, I mean, how he is now is a lot like you. Situations like that are always tangible. He might not be as quick to pick up on things that annoy him as you are, but a lot of what he does reflects parts of you that you'd rather keep hidden. And my concern is that this triggers your… issue, to come to light. Even if it's subconscious, the brain is a funny thing Banner." Amy explained as she finished drawing blood.

"So basically you're saying that something like annoyance can trigger a subconscious reaction that would cause me to change?" Bruce asked for clarification.

"Essentially." She confirmed. "But it's not just that. The reaction you have, coming from a trained eye, seems to be less about rage and more about self-preservation. James is, even now, still a loose cannon to you guys. You know what he can do and allowing him to get so close is a personal risk for all of you. So I wouldn't be surprised if you are a little higher strung than usual."

"You're pretty perceptive." Bruce gave back. "I don't think anyone else has really noticed."

She smiled. "Fear and caution are limitations to perception."

Amy dripped a small amount of Bruce's blood onto a microscope slide and peered at it through the lenses. "Damn. It's not green." She mused.

"Sorry to disappoint." Bruce chuckled. He had to admit that he was thankful for her unperturbed manner of going about these things.

She crossed her arms over chest when she straightened back up, then scratched her head. "I'll have to run some more tests, for safety's sake, but from what I can see there is nothing too concerning just yet."

By the time Amy was done with her examination on Bruce she returned to the main floor to find Bucky deep in discussion with Natasha in pure Russian. He seemed happy to speak the language again, maybe she needed to remind him that she speaks it fluently as well. They were discussing Tony while he sat on the opposite side of the table staring at them. Once Tony realized that Amy was now standing behind him, he swivelled around on the chair and gave her a big, obviously fake, smile. "Can I play with his arm?" Tony asked like a naughty child asking to play with his dad's laptop.

"Sure. But I'd be careful if I were you, Stark. He bites." She answered as she walked over to the, now silent, ex-assassins.

"You really want me to sit around while Stark pokes around in this thing?" Bucky asked raising the offending bionic limb in front of his face. His sleeves were rolled up, so the metal gleamed in the morning sunlight. Amy closed her fingers over his mechanical hand and kissed the cold metal with a smile.

"It'll make him so happy." She said turning to Tony while still holding Bucky's hand. "Just look at him, Bee. He's just like a scalded puppy, sitting all the way over there, begging for some attention."

"You know, you are exactly like my father said you'd be." Tony smirked sarcastically.

"That's because you're just like your father." She gave back, earning a grunt from Tony.

X-X-X-X-X

As the sun was setting on the horizon Steve went in search of Bucky, only to find him lounging on the stairs of the elaborate terrace of Stark Tower. As he approached he realized that Bucky was smoking again, which he hadn't done since before he enlisted.

"And that?" Steve inquired as he sat down on the other end of the steps.

Bucky looked at the cigarette, half distracted. "Old habits die hard, I guess." He shrugged.

"You okay, though?"

He nodded. "A whole lot better than I should be."

"Can I ask you something?" Steve ventured.

"Ya just did." Bucky retorted. Statements like that would annoy most people, but to Steve it was music to his ears. The Asset shrunk back into the darkness a little more every day, bringing his friend back piece by piece.

"Smart ass."

"Punk."

Steve laughed.

"Yeah, yeah, okay. But seriously now. Why don't you ever talk about it?" The question was stated with care, but the Captain had learned that the best way to get an answer out of him was to just go ahead and ask the question. Questions rarely had repercussions worse than a shrug and a change of subject.

The expression on his friend's face turned questioning. "At first I just didn't want to talk about it, didn't want to remember. It sent me into a panic state, which I fucking hate. But now I just don't see the point. It's not gonna help anyone, or change anything, so why the fuck bring it up in the first place. Honestly, I'd rather people not get stuck on it, so I shut up about it." There was surprisingly little emotion behind the statement. It was more a scientific type of explanation than a confession really.

Steve nodded, that made sense to him, in a way. "Well, I still think it would help you to talk about it to someone."

Bucky raised an eyebrow. "Like a shrink?"

Steve exhaled. "No!" Then he added. "Unless that's your thing. But I meant someone like me, or Lou, or even Natasha."

"Why do you call her that?"

"Lou?"

Bucky nodded.

"Because it annoys her." Steve admitted with a defiant smirk.

Bucky laughed, shaking his head. "Of course."

They decided then that it was time to head home, respectively.

X-X-X-X-X

"What is it about coffee?" Natasha's voice brought Bucky out his reverie as he sipped listlessly at his coffee.

"Huh?" He huffed.

"You drink way too much of it and it always seems to send you into this other world."

"It helps me remember the good stuff." The Soldier admitted. His head was particularly fuzzy today so he was weary of his surroundings and his interactions. This haze had been happening a lot lately, and he didn't like it one bit.

"You know, you're not wrong to be suspicious of SHIELD, even now." Natasha ventured tentatively.

"Is that a confession?"

She gave him a lopsided smile. "Maybe."

"What do you wanna know?" He vaguely picked up that she was trying to talk in circles, so he spared her the trouble.

She looked away, suddenly seeming uncertain of herself. "Nothing specific, I guess. You're just… interesting. You know that the maintenance methods that Chekov and Valinkoff used on you was later employed to reinforce Red Room training?"

"Maintenance methods?" He inquired.

"You know," Her smile reappeared for a brief moment, a sadder smile this time, one that spoke of her own secrets. "The rain, the snow… the sex." She all but whispered this, careful of who might hear. The last thing that Natasha wanted was to share this knowledge with anyone but him.

For a moment the fog cleared from his mind and he looked at her, searchingly, lost in a vortex of doubt. It had never even occurred to Bucky that someone else in his immediate vicinity would know about that. It was a well-known fact that the Russian brand of cognitive recalibration found its roots in Operant Conditioning, but few people really understood how severely the punishment versus reward principles were enforced to reinforce such extreme pathways. He hadn't even told Amy about it, although a part of him was convinced that she knew anyway.

"You were in the Red Room?" He asked, sounding more alarmed than he'd intended.

She nodded once. "It's hard to explain to people why you just can't bring yourself to hate them. The KGB, the Red Room, Unit 37. They're fucked up in their own special way, but for some reason they're not half as horrifying as the rest of the world. Despite everything they did to me, I can never quite drive the longing from my mind." She admitted mutely, her voice shaking almost inaudibly. Bucky figured she was looking for reassurance, reassurance that this didn't make her a monster. But how could he give her that, if he was fighting that same fight?

He hesitated for moment, struggling to place his thoughts back into a logical order. "Life is easier their way. They don't care and they do what they want. They know that there is no tomorrow, so they take without caution or consequence. All things in excess all the time because they can. Even the language is violent and indulgent. Life is easier that way. No need to apologize or stand on accord." His words hung in the air between them for a few moments. It was a confession that both of them had been too afraid to make in the past, one they had considered too cold and inhuman to be valid. But now that someone shared the view, it left both their minds wondering into different directions.

It seemed like a long time before either of them moved from their spots. Natasha was the first one to get up.

"Natasha," He said before she could leave. She stopped and turned back to him.

"I… Amy always said that it's the human disease, to want what you can't have. I think that's why it seems so… inviting. They make you think that all you want is rain, snow, and sex, so it's easier for them to always give you what you want, or what you think you want, if you do what they ask. It's not real." The realization was alien to him and didn't seem to fit into the holes in his mind, but it felt so right to say it, not matter how much it sucked. When he met Natasha's eyes again she was blinking back tears, but smiled at him anyway. A silent 'thank you' for a truth she could have never found by herself.

It was an odd sensation to the Winter Soldier; to help someone. He found he liked it. It awoke something inside of him that had been dormant. The side of him that suddenly was very sure of why he'd enlisted in the first place, and the side of him that was suddenly very sure that Steve's pining was a point of concern. He shook his head as if to try and dislodge this new volition, but it was there to stay.

X-X-X-X-X

Bucky was sprawled across the bed in the hotel room, listening to the faint sound of Amy in the shower. His mind was wondering away from him again, and this time he didn't do much to try and stop it. In truth, he had made a sort of peace with these slivers of memories his mind presented him with. They had become less intrusive and less violent since he had come into contact with people on a more regular basis. Who could have guessed?

He was so deep in thought by the time she was done that he did not notice her standing in the doorframe, staring at him. Her mind was reeling and her heart raced. There was something she needed to tell him, but for the first time in her life was not sure how to go about it. A large part of the old James was back, but PTSD, especially complex PTSD like this was infinitely complicated. Not to mention all the consequences that long term cognitive reinforcement and maintenance had. It was something she could not have told him initially; he would have withdrawn from her immediately, but he was making progress, he was connecting with Natasha and allowing Tony to play with his arm. He was reaching out to more people now, so he had to be told, before he found out from someone else. They had never kept things from each other, and she was not planning to start now.

"I need to tell you something."

He propped himself up on his elbows, focusing his attention on her as she stood there in the doorframe. She had her torn jeans on and a simple black tank-top, her hair was wet. For a moment the sight of her distracted him from the worry in her voice. Although they had shared a bed ever since the first night they'd been back together there had been no sex. At first he was too afraid to touch her, and then she had urged him to wait until he was sure he could trust himself fully, she did not want him to bury himself in physical sensation. Something about sublimation or something along those lines, he couldn't remember the word, but it made perfect sense at time. He hadn't been ready for it before, he'd have used it to distract himself from the pain. Now was a different story, the pain seemed far away as she stood there with the glow of the white bathroom light behind her.

"James." He shook his head, trying to dislodge the thought.

"Yeah? You wanted to tell me something."

"I didn't tell you before, because I thought you would… see it differently." She began, choosing her words wisely. "But you're getting better now, and I think you're in a good enough place to make a conscious decision about it, a decision that comes from a place that can reason, whatever the outcome of your reasoning might be, it won't come from a place that is bitter." This made him much more attentive to her words, and it made his blood rush to his head. This wasn't like her at all.

"What is it?"

She pursed her lips. "I spent a lot of time in Russia during the 80's and 90's. Made some friends there who appealed to the sicker side of me. The side that is inquisitive beyond reasonable reservation. I had access to their research and I consulted on some of their projects. Specifically the Winter Soldier programme…."

For a moment his world went numb and words lost all meaning. She'd worked for Unit 37, willingly…

"Did you know?" He managed to ask.

"Of course not. Chekov wouldn't let me near any of it. He gave me the basics and told me it was a Hydra experiment. I knew nothing but the bare minimum I needed to give them the right cues to follow, the right rewards to give, perfected the schedule and the input methods." She gave back. "But I didn't ask either. I could have, but I didn't." She admitted.

"Why not?" The blank haze hung heavy in his mind, and in his soul.

"I had no reason to. There was no one left in the world for me to worry about. It was just something else I could learn."

A silence followed. He slowly sat up and let his head fall forward, running his hand through his hair. He didn't know what to think about it, what to make of it. Bucky had always known she was capable of darker things than the general population, it is that way with all scientists, but he'd never imagined that he would come to one of her pawns. He wanted to deny all of it, to tell her it didn't matter, that she had no reason to worry. But it did matter. In that moment, it mattered. She could have stopped this.

"I need a… I can't…" He stammered, unable to form a coherent sentence. He realized that he was shaking. A part of him wanted to lunge out and strange her now, earnestly, for good measure.

"You need time. I know." She stated cautiously. "Should I leave, or do you want to take a walk?"

"I don't know." He answered, gritting his teeth. "Maybe it's better I stay here." He added a few moments later.

She nodded and left silently, leaving a whirlwind of emotion behind her. In spite of everything Bucky was grateful for her confounded fucking honesty.

For a long while he simply sat there, heart pounding a million miles a minute. He tried to keep his breathing steady at least, but he was failing. He strained the fingers on his left hand and before he knew what he was doing he leapt up and shattered the huge mirror in the corner of the fancy room. He stared aimlessly down at the shattered shards of glass. Shattered like his mind, fragmented like his memories, useless…

Images flashed before his mind's eye. Images of his time in Russia, doing Ivan Chekov's bidding. How he'd been treated there was infinitely better than how he'd been treated in Germany, but even that had taken time to materialize. They treated him like a child. Beat him half to death when he fucked up, but pumped him full of cocaine and vodka when he'd done well. And when he had pleased them, truly pleased them, they'd give him girls… As many as he wanted to do with whatever he pleased. He'd felt vaguely human then. After a few years working for the Russians they stopped sticking him in Cryo so often, he went under only once every 3 years, instead of once every 6 months. And more importantly, they didn't wipe him after every mission. Sometimes an entire year would go by without him having to go back to the chair. Beatings he could handle, even the Cryo wasn't always that daunting, but the chair… He felt a shiver of rage and fear wrack his body as the memories of that pain flashed through his tired mind. He closed his eyes, inhaling sharply and baling the metal hand into a fist.

She could have stopped all of this 30 fucking years ago, but instead she saw fit to help _them_. There were some things he couldn't reason around. He was pissed, and he had every fucking right to be.

The soldier stormed off, abandoning his concern for the well-being of the public. He needed air.

X-X-X-X-X

Amy decided that wondering around aimlessly wasn't going to do her any good so she headed straight for Stark Tower; she needed the distraction that was Tony Stark. She had expected a reaction like this, no matter how much it hurt her, she knew it was necessary and that she couldn't keep it from him. Still, it wasn't pleasant and it left her with something she wasn't used to, something she fucking hated; uncertainty.

Amy knew it would take time for him to process this. It was a low blow. But it needed out. If this did mean the end of her second chance with him, then so be it… although she wasn't sure herself if she could handle that. None the less, she refused to live a lie, refused to hide it. You face up to your actions, always. This was never negotiable to her, not when she decided to spent the rest of her life with a soldier and definitely not now.

Tony was still awake, which didn't surprise her. Pepper was in DC for business so he didn't sleep much.

"You told him, didn't you?" Was the first thing that came out of Tony's mouth when she stepped out of the elevator.

She nodded, suddenly fighting tears. Howard Stark, Tony's father, had been a dear friend to her, one of the few people in her life she was willing to let in, and after James and Steve died, Howard became her sole comfort. He carried her through the worst part of her life, and Tony was a lot like his father.

"What did he do? He didn't hurt you, did he?" Tony asked as he got up from where he was sitting.

"No, he didn't hurt me. But he's pissed. I knew he would be. But it still sucks."

"Are you okay? No wait, stupid question. Do you want me to kick his ass? I can totally kick his ass. Just say the word and I'll suite up" She interrupted him with a small laugh and a hand on his chest, "Calm down kid, I just need a distraction." She stated, wiping an idle tear from her cheek.

"Luckily for you that's exactly what I'm good at it!" Tony proclaimed before dragging her by the arm to the bar where he poured her a drink and pulled up two of his translucent screens.

"I've actually been meaning to show you something." He said as he clicked around on them, clearly looking for whatever it is he wanted to show her. Once he found what he was looking for he swivelled the screen so she could see what was on it.

"I got the results back for Banner's blood sample and since you weren't here, and I'm, well, me, I was impatient so I compared his sample with the records from Steve's blood, and look at that! The mutations are exactly the same." Tony exclaimed. He tended to become quite exacerbated when he was excited, he'd been that way all his life, even as a child telling her that he'd made a paper boat float down the stream. He didn't remember this, of course, he had been young the last time she visited the Starks, quite some time before they died.

She looked intently at the screens, her mind focused on work now, a switch she had all but mastered flipping. "I had expected as much, actually." She said as she inflated the sample referred to on Tony's screen as 'rage monster'.

"But how? Why? The radiation? The ricochet? The big green bad guy?" Tony stammered.

Amy chuckled. "It actually has less effect than you might think. He got the serum itself right, he buggered up the process though, but that isn't all that impressive actually. The Hulk is just a reaction of consequence, if he had been ready for the serum himself then the mistake in the process he made would have had no effect at all."

"All that gamma radiation would have done nothing?"

"Nope."

"Seriously, what is in that serum?"

"It's not that, Tony. The radiation exposure would take time to manifest, and by the time it starts to have an effect the serum would have protected him against it already." She explained, amused by Tony's level of interest.

"Then why the angry, scary, green son of a bitch?"

She laughed. "The serum is an actualizing agent. It facilitates a state of continuous and sustained self-actualization. If you administer it to someone who is not actualized then you are forcing someone into a physical and mental state that they are not ready to sustain. It's a defence mechanism. The Hulk is who he thinks he needs to be in order to be the best possible version of himself, or at least, it is the warped and twisted manifestation thereof, and it's affected by his mind-set at the time as well. He did it for the wrong reasons, and that translates into the final product. Never heard of the Red Skull?"

At that last bit Tony blinked and threw his hands up in the air. "Of course!" Then he looked at her with a slightly uncharacteristic glint of concern in his eyes. "So, is there anything you can do for him?"

"Me? No. This is something he has to do for himself. And he's not gonna like it. That I can promise you." Amy answered.

Tony did not press her any further. He changed the subject and started talking about a whole lot of nothing, the way that only a Stark could. He made her laugh and protest and explain. He made her elaborate on details about people she'd known years ago who interested him, places she had been that he wanted to see, and things of historical significance she had been involved in. She appreciated this banter more than she could ever say, it kept the nagging pain and guilt at arms-length away from her.

It was only once Banner showed up that they realized they'd been there all night.

Amy wasted no time in informing Bruce of her findings about his blood, after she had chased Tony off to bed.

"That doesn't make any sense." Bruce said thoughtfully, staring at the sample layouts on the screen. They had relocated to a lab, where Banner was more comfortable.

"It makes perfect sense. It just isn't what you want to hear." She ventured. Amy was far less concerned about angering him than other people were.

"Then how am I supposed to get rid of him?" Banner demanded, visibly trying to keep himself calm.

"Well, in truth, it's easier said than done. It's purely psychological. And even if you get it right then he will never really go away, you'll just be able to have full control, all the time, even during an episode when you choose to bring one on."

"How is that possible?" Bruce asked, now more interested in what she had to say.

"You can still get to that point where you are actualized. But in order to do that you need to be at complete peace, with _all_ of you. Even him." She answered.

Bruce laughed, bitterly. "You have such a positive outlook on life." He stated sarcastically.

Usually she'd find this funny, but today was a little difficult for her. "Hence my level of personal and professional success in this particular area you braved so blindly, doctor Banner. In fact, one would reckon I'd be a little peeved that you decided to try and copy my procedures for your own personal gain, but thankfully, as you so sardonically pointed out, I have a positive outlook on life, so live and let live."

At that she left him to do with the information what he pleased. In the end it did nothing to her whether he used it to his advantage or not, at least in this her hands were clean.

After her encounter with Banner, Amy decided that it was best to go do something productive while she bought time for James to process the devastation she had wracked on him the previous night. She wasn't sure whether it was a good thing for her to go home, so she went down to the VA to find Sam, maybe she could help out there for the day.

X-X-X-X-X

Bucky spent the night wondering about aimlessly, avoiding people as far as possible, trying to wage the war in his head in silence. As the hours dragged on and the sun began to rise over the ocean he found himself standing with his arms resting on the railing of the peer, where he'd found her waiting for him that first day. He couldn't remember how he'd gotten here or how long he'd been standing here. The realization of where he was and why he was there began to turn his mood from blind anger to tired despair. He sighed heavily and rested his head on his folded arms.

Amy was the one thing in his life that had never hurt him. She was everything, always had been, and he couldn't believe that she would do something like this. Now that his anger was melting away he could think a little more clearly, but the heaviness in his heart weighed him down.

He _loved_ her, fiercely. He _knew_ this. But this hurt. They had never allowed their love to hurt them. It was supposed to make them stronger, better. Not the puppy-dog highschool love they saw in their friends, the ones that burned bright only to wither and die, turning sour. Theirs was supposed to be different. And now this…

He forced the pleasant memories of her aside and tried to remember Russia, his handlers, the things they did to him. He shivered as the images flashed before his mind's eye. And still, he found himself thinking, if he ever had to go back to being the Winter Soldier and he had to choose his handlers, he would go with the Russians, without a doubt. Germany was bad, it was terrible and he was nothing more than an experiment, a _subject_ to them, but Pierce was the worst. Pierce was a monster. He had him wiped almost once a month and stuck in Cryo sometimes 12 times in one year. He hurt him more and took more from him the few short years he'd been the Soldier's handler than Germany and Russia combined.

The Russians might have treated him like a child, but at least he was human, as human to them as the rest of the world was. They're a hard and unforgiving people, but they are honest and they helped him a lot as well.

As the warmth of the rising sun settled on his body his heart began to defrost, ever so slowly as small realizations began to dawn on him.

It was probably better in Russia because she was pulling some strings in how he was handled. His time in Russia probably helped him because she was the only one who knew what she was doing and Chekov listened to her. The fewer wipes and less Cryo was possible because she was so good at coaching them to do the maintenance and the reinforcement in a way that it wasn't necessary for them to start over or preserve pathways so violently anymore. And what reason _did_ she have to care at the time? Everyone she loved was gone, _he _was gone. He had left her, he'd gone to war and died.

He sighed heavily as tears spilled from his eyes, defeated. Bucky couldn't blame her for this. He couldn't be angry at her for this. As desperately as he wanted to blame someone and to be angry at someone, it couldn't be her. He loved her too much, he needed her, he wanted her. All of her, the bad parts too, the broken parts, parts that he had broken. And she wanted him too. That's why she didn't lie. She told him because she loves him and respects him. She told him because she loves all of him, even the bad and broken parts.

He lifted his face to the rising sun and sobbed. Crying for the first time in 72 years.

Once the deep sorrow had leaked out of his soul he was left with a strange sort of peace and he felt more alive than ever. He'd forgiven Amaryne, but more importantly, he had forgiven himself…

X-X-X-X-X

Amy hadn't been at the VA for long before Sam came to tell her that Tony had been looking for her. When she called Stark she was more than a little surprised to hear that James had called there looking for her. He told Tony he was waiting for her back at the hotel room.

To say she was nervous was an understatement.

When she opened the door to the hotel room she found him standing by the window, staring out across the city, silent as the grave. A small part of her consciousness noted the fact that the mirror in the corner had vanished and the room had been valet cleaned, she figured he hadn't been here all night after all.

He said nothing as he turned around and came to stand in front of her. He said nothing as he put his metal hand under her chin and brought her face up to kiss her. Gently at first, but then deeper, until he was almost breathless. He said nothing as he lifted her shirt over her head. He said nothing when she asked him if he was sure this was what he wanted, he only kissed her again.

He lowered her onto the bed and they sealed their promise to each other, once again, in a haze of sweat and release. Release from the bonds that bound them to their past. Release from the pain they had, unwillingly, inflicted on each other.

It was only after the haze had begun to abate from them that he spoke for the first time. And when he spoke she realized that there was truly very little left of the Winter Soldier in the man in whose arms she found herself.

"I love you."

X-X-X-X-X

A few weeks passed where they didn't do much but talk. They switched their phones off and stayed in the hotel room. There was a lot of talk, a lot of laughter, some tears, and not a small amount of sex. They had a lot of time to catch up on.

Eventually though, they knew they would have to immerge and face the music.

Bruce Banner was still pissed at Amy, so he kept his distance at best. Steve picked up on the change in his friends before anyone else did and he was as happy as a kid in a candy store to say the least. Natasha and Bucky still had their heated Russian discussions, most of them concerning Tony or Fury.

Fury had given up on getting answers by now, and the current political situation was so suspiciously calm that they hadn't been called on a mission in almost 3 months.

One day it just so happened that they got to telling war stories. Steve obviously had quite a few of these. Natasha had a share of her own, and so did Barton. Amy did her fair share of talking as she had seen the most for the longest. These war stories weren't of the heavy kind that weighed them down, but rather the kind that left them laughing. It surprised most of the when even Bucky added his two cents, mostly about the Commando's and one particularly hilarious situation he'd come face to face with Russia, involving his handler and a transvestite…

Sam mostly listened, but everyone was far too interested in the Falcon to allow him to say nothing. His experience was more recent so it shed some light on the current state of affairs.

The night went on for quite some time before people started heading home. Amy and James, along with Sam were the last remaining aside from Tony and Pepper, who lived in Stark Tower permanently. While Amy was helping Pepper carry glasses and bottles back to the bar where the cleaning crew would get to them tomorrow Tony was seeing Steve out. Bucky stood by the door, swigging on a beer, looking at the girls chatting and laughing, the sense of peace he'd found after his breakdown had not left him yet. Sam appeared next to him, shaking his head at Amy who saw fit to twirl around the cold marble floor with bare feet.

"Doesn't she ever get cold?" He asked Bucky.

"She likes the cold. Says it reminds her she's still alive." Bucky noted.

"Gotta be some irony in that." Sam gave back.

Bucky huffed, "And don't think she hasn't pointed it out yet."

There was a few moments of calm silence before Sam spoke again, more hesitantly this time.

"I don't know how you sleep man. I mean, I haven't seen half the shit you've seen, but I can't sleep worth a damn."

Bucky figured that Sam had his own issues, but he didn't think it was this bad. Maybe he was luckier than he thought.

"I didn't, at first."

"What changed?" Sam asked.

"Not sure. I guess I did. I stopped trying to kid myself into believing it was a fight I had to fight alone. I mean, no one will ever really _get_ it, but a lot of people are _trying_ to get it. And that makes more of a difference than I ever thought possible." Bucky ventured. He had never put it into words like that before.

"Guess you've got a point." Sam stated. "But it's not just that. The nightmares are one thing, but it's stupid shit too. Like my bed. I got so used to sleeping in the rough that when I get home the damn bed feels like a marshmallow, like I'm gonna fall right through it. And I can't stand that feeling, like I'm falling."

Bucky nodded. "Yeah, I get that too." He admitted, then he smiled to himself as Amy threw herself at Tony when he immerged from the lift, catching him off guard and making him duck as if she was gonna clock him in the face. "But it's not so bad when you've got someone to hold on to."

X-X-X-X-X

When they got back to the hotel room that night they didn't go straight to sleep, for a while they just lay there, entwined in each other. Bucky was lulling between sleep and wake as Amy played with her own hair, something she always fervently denied doing.

"Babe." He croaked.

"Hmm?" She hummed as she turned her head to look at him.

"Will you cut my hair tomorrow?" He asked.

When she didn't answer he opened one eye to find her grinning at him from ear to ear.

"I thought you'd never ask."

And so the locks of dark hair that partially marked him as the Winter Soldier were cut off the next morning to reveal a pleasantly familiar face the next time he looked in the mirror. Bucky Barnes was back to stay.

X-X-X-X-X


End file.
